Covers the processes of commodification of emotion about now reach into all areas of labor processes, extending even to private life and intimate relationships. This title takes concepts to study the diversity of this economic intrusion into family, education, and nursing in the service sector as well as into corporate management.

How do we define compassion? Is it an emotional state, a motivation, a dispositional trait, or a cultivated attitude? How does it compare to altruism and empathy? Chapters in this Handbook present critical scientific evidence about compassion in numerous conceptions. All of these approaches to thinking about compassion are valid and contribute importantly to understanding how we respond to others who are suffering. Covering multiple levels of our lives and self-concept, from the individual, to the group, to the organization and culture, The Oxford Handbook of Compassion Science gathers evidence and models of compassion that treat the subject of compassion science with careful scientific scrutiny and concern. It explores the motivators of compassion, the effect on physiology, the co-occurrence of wellbeing, and compassion training interventions. Sectioned by thematic approaches, it pulls together basic and clinical research ranging across neurobiological, developmental, evolutionary, social, clinical, and applied areas in psychology such as business and education. In this sense, it comprises one of the first multidisciplinary and systematic approaches to examining compassion from multiple perspectives and frames of reference. With contributions from well-established scholars as well as young rising stars in the field, this Handbook bridges a wide variety of diverse perspectives, research methodologies, and theory, and provides a foundation for this new and rapidly growing field. It should be of great value to the new generation of basic and applied researchers examining compassion, and serve as a catalyst for academic researchers and students to support and develop the modern world.

Many descriptions of empathy revolve around sharing in and understanding another person’s emotions. One separate person gains access to the emotional world of another. An entire worldview holds up this idea. It is individualistic and affirms the possibility of access to other people’s “inner world.” Can we really see inside another, though? And are we discrete, separate selves? How can we best grapple with these questions in the field of music therapy? In response, this book offers four empathy pathways. Two are situated in a constituent approach (that prioritises discrete individuals who then enter into relationships with one another) and two are located in relational approaches (that acknowledge the foundational reality of relationships themselves). By understanding empathy more fully, music therapists, teachers and researchers can engage in ways that are congruent with diverse worldviews and ways of being. Examples used in the book are from active and receptive music therapy approaches as well as from community and clinical contexts, so as to provide clear links to practice. This book will be a valuable resource for academics and postgraduate students within music therapy and allied fields including art therapy, drama therapy, dance/movement therapy, psychology, counselling, occupational therapy and social development studies.

New York Post Best Book of 2016 We often think of our capacity to experience the suffering of others as the ultimate source of goodness. Many of our wisest policy-makers, activists, scientists, and philosophers agree that the only problem with empathy is that we don’t have enough of it. Nothing could be farther from the truth, argues Yale researcher Paul Bloom. In AGAINST EMPATHY, Bloom reveals empathy to be one of the leading motivators of inequality and immorality in society. Far from helping us to improve the lives of others, empathy is a capricious and irrational emotion that appeals to our narrow prejudices. It muddles our judgment and, ironically, often leads to cruelty. We are at our best when we are smart enough not to rely on it, but to draw instead upon a more distanced compassion. Basing his argument on groundbreaking scientific findings, Bloom makes the case that some of the worst decisions made by individuals and nations—who to give money to, when to go to war, how to respond to climate change, and who to imprison—are too often motivated by honest, yet misplaced, emotions. With precision and wit, he demonstrates how empathy distorts our judgment in every aspect of our lives, from philanthropy and charity to the justice system; from medical care and education to parenting and marriage. Without empathy, Bloom insists, our decisions would be clearer, fairer, and—yes—ultimately more moral. Brilliantly argued, urgent and humane, AGAINST EMPATHY shows us that, when it comes to both major policy decisions and the choices we make in our everyday lives, limiting our impulse toward empathy is often the most compassionate choice we can make.

Recent work on empathy theory, research, and applications, by scholars from disciplines ranging from neuroscience to psychoanalysis. There are many reasons for scholars to investigate empathy. Empathy plays a crucial role in human social interaction at all stages of life; it is thought to help motivate positive social behavior, inhibit aggression, and provide the affective and motivational bases for moral development; it is a necessary component of psychotherapy and patient-physician interactions. This volume covers a wide range of topics in empathy theory, research, and applications, helping to integrate perspectives as varied as anthropology and neuroscience. The contributors discuss the evolution of empathy within the mammalian brain and the development of empathy in infants and children; the relationships among empathy, social behavior, compassion, and altruism; the neural underpinnings of empathy; cognitive versus emotional empathy in clinical practice; and the cost of empathy. Taken together, the contributions significantly broaden the interdisciplinary scope of empathy studies, reporting on current knowledge of the evolutionary, social, developmental, cognitive, and neurobiological aspects of empathy and linking this capacity to human communication, including in clinical practice and medical education.

What if there were a single skill that could directly and radically improve your relationships and your emotional life? Empathy, teaches Karla McLaren, is that skill. With The Art of Empathy, she teaches us how to perceive and feel the experiences of others with clarity and authenticity—to connect with them more deeply and effectively. Informed by current insights from neuroscience, social psychology, and healing traditions, this book explores: Why empathy is not a mystical phenomenon but a natural, innate ability that we can strengthen and develop • How to identify and regulate our emotions and boundaries • The process of shifting into the perspective of others • How to provide support in a sensitive and healthy way • Insights for navigating our hyper-connected social landscape • Targeted chapters for improving family, workplace, and intimate relationships • Ways to expand our empathy to our community, global levels of society, and the natural world Empathy, reflects Karla McLaren, is the skill that builds bridges— a skill that not only creates connection, but that helps us to be more effective in all areas of our lives.

Changing the Subject explores ways of engaging across difference. In this first book-length study of the concept of empathy from a rhetorical perspective, Lisa Blankenship frames the classical concept of pathos in new ways and makes a case for rhetorical empathy as a means of ethical rhetorical engagement. The book considers how empathy can be a deliberate, conscious choice to try to understand others through deep listening and how language and other symbol systems play a role in this process that is both cognitive and affective. Departing from agonistic win-or-lose rhetoric in the classical Greek tradition that has so strongly influenced Western thinking, Blankenship proposes that we ourselves are changed (“changing the subject” or the self) when we focus on trying to understand rather than simply changing an Other. This work is informed by her experiences growing up in the conservative South and now working as a professor in New York City, as well as the stories and examples of three people working across profound social, political, class, and gender differences: Jane Addams’s activist work on behalf of immigrants and domestic workers in Gilded Age Chicago; the social media advocacy of Brazilian rap star and former maid Joyce Fernandes for domestic worker labor reform; and the online activist work of Justin Lee, a queer Christian who advocates for greater understanding and inclusion of LGBTQ+ people in conservative Christian churches. A much-needed book in the current political climate, Changing the Subject charts new theoretical ground and proposes ways of integrating principles of rhetorical empathy in our everyday lives to help fight the temptations of despair and disengagement. The book will appeal to students, scholars, and teachers of rhetoric and composition as well as people outside the academy in search of new ways of engaging across differences.